Thermal camera information

We are a small dept and are looking for some literature and info on thermal imaging cameras. Can anyone tell me about the one you use how good it is and any problems you have had with it. Any help would be appreciated. Be safe

Avoid the Cairns Iris. Go with a handheld. Our Iris has been out at thier factory for a 4 week upgrade since last November and every effort to either get it back or get them to do the upgrade has been met with confusion on thier part(ie whether or not they have it, have authorization for upgrade etc) Its bulky and akward and the after sale support is almost non existant( although after we told them to ship it back and not do the $4700 upgrade they managed to find a loaner for us). A handheld is much more practical than having to deal with a bulky helmet mounted deal. The screen on them is very sensitive for viewing angle and it takes forever to adjust it to be able to see, and the slightest bump and its gone again.

Get all the dealers to bring in thier units and give demos, then extract the factual information from the smoke and mirrors after testing them out if you can.
Good luck

Start by getting information on products, who is handling service, and pricing.Do Not look at price alone.See who is going to take care of product support,do they have a loaner camera?Once you have narrowed your search down to say three units,test them under actual conditions in a burn building or aquired structure.Use small fires,you don't need the camera to find the big ones.On the first round of training,just smoke the building up then put someone inside as a "victim down".Smoke machines work well for this.Have the crews do a search with each of the cameras.Check for ease of battery changing in low light/smoke conditions.Compare the cameras against each other amongst yourselves.There is a lot of nice equipment out there.Steve, you might want to leave the battery out of your Scott for the four days to see if you have a power drain or a bad battery or charger.They should last quite a bit longer that four days(more like thirty)without charging.T.C.

we have a Talisman. very good camera. i believe that i read in an article in fire/rescue, that the camera we have is the only one that passed and is approved by the US coasgaurd. goes through numerous test to be approved by the CG such as: has to cut on in less than 30 seconds, survive a 30 ft drop while on, and not cut off on impact and a lot of other things. batterys will last a while. comes with a pack that you can pop AA batteries in, in the event that the 2 rechargable packs go dead. we have the charger on the truck, and the charger on a timer, and set to charge 15 min a day. talisman is definetly the best in my opinion. one like we have runs about 18 grand. also has a higher tech version that can send images to a tv/vcr remotely on the fireground. we did the smoke test that was mentioned, and the images are clearer and temps are more distinct with the talisman than with the other option, which i think was a scott. do your homework and you won't go wrong!

Talisman was also camera of choice for the US Navy after exhaustive tests.You also can get a video overlay feature which can be handy in certain circumstances.Talisman also has ,I believe, the only transmitter that is encrypted.One of my personal favorites although as I stated earlier,any camera is better than no camera.T.C.

Thermal Imager

If you want to learn about thermal imagers. I researched the internet for info. There are about 30 different types. Of these types there are 3 different technologies. The first for the most part is not being used in todays fire service. It needeed repaired to often. the second is BST technology. This has moving parts and can be damaged if the camera recieves a good jolt or is dropped the wrong way. the third is mocrobolometer technology. Many cameras have this now but most have small problems. The manufactures have added new technology to hide the problems. Colors and heat sensors to tell how hot its is or thermal intensifiers. A Camera needs to be simple. The main overall purpose of a camera is to locate people, not see how hotthe fire is or what the temp is. Of the several third generation technology cameras out there all are good. Some features over ride the purchasers main intent of the camera, to find and rescue people. Yes you can do other items with the cameras and all will do the same thing in different ways. The big thing is looking to see white outs in a camera when in fire, some have added the colors to hide the blurring or the ghosting as its called. There are some real good cameras on the market the best one I think is hard to find info on. if you want contact me. firewalker50@hotmail.com